by Amy Brent
Vernon was a place where things passed through, not stuck around. Even the litter that got sprinkled in the parking lot’s diner blew away before it could annoy anybody. The few people that lived here catered to the drivers who passed through: the gas station had more diesel pumps than gasoline pumps, and special hoses to pour as much as diesel into a tank as fast as they could. The stores here sold things that were small, easy to bring along or leave behind. There was no artisanal craftsmanship here—a spoon was just a spoon, it was up to the user to imbue it with meaning.
The transient nature of everything in Vernon suited her. It was a place that felt much the same as she did—unsure of her future, forced to keep her options open, waiting for something or someone to come along that would give them meaning. In Vernon’s case this came in the form of a bi-annual county fair, which brought in people from the seven surrounding counties to ride the rickety ferris wheels and throw balls at weighted milk bottles. For those two weeks the people were united, more or less, in the sentimentality for small-town life. In her case, eight months after she settled here, she was still trying to figure out what that was.
“Busy day,” called Jack Tremain, the short-order cook, as she came in through the back door. The stainless-steel kitchen and the linoleum floors gave off the scent of cooking grease. Out front, the diner had been decorated with plastic poinsettias and strings of colored lights that flickered intermittently, but the menu was still the same: eggs available three ways, iceberg lettuce, ketchup or mustard, lemon meringue or banana. It kept things simple.
“So I see,” she said, peeking out at the diners. It was crowded today—everybody was going to family, and out in Oklahoma, that meant at least a 4-hour drive to anywhere. She tied on her apron and pulled the scrunchie tight around her hair, checked her makeup in the reflection of the walk-in freezer, and stepped out.
There were lots of families, which was something that she didn’t usually see here. There were some truckers, which were more usual. All of them got a big smile and quick service from her and Darlene, the other waitress. Most of them tipped well, too. But the talk in the diner wasn’t about long-distance friends or family. There was a huge snowstorm rolling in off the Rockies, and Shandy heard phrases like “polar vortex” and “haboob” being bandied about. “Bad weather’s coming in,” everybody agreed. “Best get on our way.”
By three in the afternoon the skies were dark—if it’d been tornado season the tornado alarms would be going off like crazy—and the first flakes, hard and brittle from the dry air, were swirling around the cars in the lot. As if on cue, people began paying and leaving—on the TV, the weatherman was pointing out a massive cloud of red superimposed on a map of Oklahoma and Texas: storm was approaching, quickly.
“You oughta get home,” Shandy said to Jack and Darlene, as they watched the ring of yellow approaching their corner of Oklahoma.
“You sure?” asked Jack.
Shandy shrugged. “I ain’t got no family,” she said. “And my apartment’s just a mile down the road. Not like I have to drive twenty minutes.”
Darlene nodded gratefully and hung up her apron. The storm had been worrying her, and as she grabbed her keys she said, “You’re a doll, Shandy—I’ll pay you back for this.”
Shandy nodded and waved them good-bye but she didn’t say anything. Truth was, she didn’t want to be in her apartment, with its cheap thrift-store furniture and no Christmas tree, watching It’s a Wonderful Life and National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation over and over again, reminding her of what she’d never had. She could borrow Marvin’s boots—he hadn’t come in today but he was usually the one shoveling the lot when it snowed—if she had to walk back. He wouldn’t mind.
She filled a bucket and got a few rags, and began wiping down the empty tables, washing up the pots and pans. The power hadn’t gone out yet, so she fired up the jukebox and set it to cycle through every album in its collection. Keep busy, don’t think about Christmas—
Chapter 82
She was wiping down the griddle when she heard banging on the front door. Who’s out now, in this God-forsaken weather?
She realized, when she came out front, that the diner’s lights were still on. “That explains a lot,” she muttered to herself, as she unlocked the door. There were three men standing there, one of them slumped between the other two. It wasn’t until they were inside that she realized that she was alone—that this could be a ruse—that they could—
“Thanks, miss,” said the first one. He was tall, square-jawed with the kind of brooding good looks that reminded her of nothing so much as the Marlboro Man. His eyes were even blue, and his hair—what she could see of it under his hat—was a dirty straw-blond. She felt her guard go up right away—she and Darlene called these kinds of guys the “ass-handers”, because they were always grabbing their asses. But they tipped well, so if their hands occasionally went up her skirt she kept her mouth shut. “We’ve been trying to get Truman—”
“Ain’t nothin’ wrong wi’ me,” said the one who was slumped between the other two. Truman looked younger than she was, even, though it might have been that his face had gone slack from being drunk. He had long hair—he reminded her of the hero on the covers of all those Harlequin novels, patrician nose, the intense stare (well, it would have been intense had he been sober enough to stare), the shirt opened to the waist, revealing a chiseled body. To be sure, they’d probably opened his shirt so that he wouldn’t throw up on it—but that didn’t mean she couldn’t appreciate the view.
“Everythin’s wrong with you,” said the third one, slapping the slumped one on the back of his head. He had dark hair and his brows were drawn together. He didn’t seem to be the smiling kind of guy—Shandy was under the impression that, while Number One might be the one dictating what the three of them did, this guy was the one who was really in charge. “We didn’t notice he was drinkin’, ma’am. We just need someplace to sit while this lummox sober up, is all.”
“How long do you think that’s gonna take?” she asked. “Storm’s comin’, you know.”
“Shit,” said Number One to Number Three. “Should we keep on drivin’, then?”
“I ain’t takin’ this shitsack if he’s gonna throw up every two minutes,” said Number Three.
As if in response the clouds behind them turned bright white for a split second, and the thunder that followed sent a jolt of fright through all four of them. “Ain’t drivin’ in this weather, either,” said Number Three, as the snow, which had been falling steadily for the past hour, sudden turned into a wall of white.
Shandy sighed. “Looks like we’re stuck,” she said, sighing. “You guys will be popsicles within five minutes in this weather.”
“Thanks ma’am,” said Number One. “We won’t be any trouble. Promise.”
There was one thing that Shandy had learned by now, though: no matter what a man said, if he promised not to make any trouble, trouble was probably coming no matter what.
Chapter 83
Tucker and Kellan set Truman in a booth and took seats at the counter. The place was eerily empty. The three of them had eaten at their fair share of diners over the past five years or so, since they’d started at the Glenco Ranch together, and they’d come to expect the foul-mouthed short-order cook at the griddle, covered in grease and smudges; the over-made-up waitress who could out-swear them as soon as fuck them; the quiet tight-lipped regular who, if prodded the right way, would take out his guitar and play them a song. A diner that was empty except for the one waitress—who was neither overly made-up nor seemed to be the cussing type—took some getting used to.
Kellan had been hoping to get a soda, at least, but after Tucker had promised not to be any trouble he realized that he had to keep his mouth shut. “They’re probably out of everythin’ anyway,” said Tucker, trying to get a look at her again through the door.
“You’re fuckin’ horny again,” said Kellan in disbelief.
Tucker shrugged, not denying it
. “What if I am?” he asked. “She’s easy on the eyes, that’s for sure.”
Kellan punched Tucker in the arm. Tucker, with his rugged, Marlboro-man good looks, was always thinking with his dick—he never had to work too hard to charm the ladies into the sack with him. When the girl came out again, to ask them if they wanted anything to drink—“Soda machine’s out, but I can let you guys have something in the bottles,” she said—he watched her, wondering if she saw it. She was younger than most of the ones that Tucker usually got—he’d have to take it easy with the flirting if he wanted to have a chance with her.
“Thanks,” Tucker said. “Got a few cold ones back there? We’ll pay for ‘em—don’t want you gettin’ in trouble for helpin’ a coupla cowpokes outta a tight spot.”
“You’re cowboys?” she asked.
“Hell yeah,” said Tucker, grinning. Kellan felt the twitch start—Tucker would start flirting and he and Truman would be left sitting out here while he fucked her to screaming in the back. “Kellan—that’s him—I’m Tucker, by the way, and that sodden lump of drunkenness is Truman. We work at Glenco—maybe you heard of ‘em?” Glenco was just south of the Red River, one of the biggest cattle ranchers in the business.
She nodded, but it was hard to tell if she was just being polite or if she’d actually heard of it. The few words she’d spoken so far had given them enough to guess that while she was from the South, she wasn’t from that part of the country.
Kellan had to confess that Tucker knew what he was talking about. Her breasts were ample without being freakishly large, and when she turned to head back into the kitchen, the way the uniform fell about her suggested that her ass was more than pert. “She’s just a kid,” hissed Kellan, as soon as the door closed. “You’re not going to—”
“Relax,” Tucker said, grinning. “I can’t help it if a woman wants to strip naked for me—”
She came back with two bottles of beer and one club soda. “For your buddy,” she said, handing Tucker the club soda.
“So what’s someone like you doing out here in the middle of Fuck-All?” asked Tucker, as he passed the bottle to Truman.
She shrugged. “Just passing through, I guess,” she said.
“You guess?” Tucker asked.
“I don’t know,” she said, becoming slightly defensive. “Why is anybody here?”
“We’re on our way to Kansas for the holidays,” said Kellan, quickly, before things could get nasty. “You got anybody you’re gonna go home to?”
She shook her head. “My mom’s dead, and my dad—well, he’s been out of the picture since I was born, so…”
Tucker shot Kellan a glare. “Shit, miss, we’re sorry,” Tucker said, now.
“What’re we sorry ‘bout?” The one named Truman was sitting up, now. He reached for his bottle of club soda and drank it down in one long chug.
“You’re going to be sorry for having drunk all of my booze,” Kellan snapped. “You’re the reason we’re spending Christmas holed up in this diner in the middle of Fuck-if-I-Know, Oklahoma.”
“Vernon,” she said, and the three of them turned to look at her. “That’s the name of this town,” she added.
“Like I said, fuck if I know,” Kellan said, sourly.
“You’re the ones who are here,” she pointed out.
Tucker coughed. Feisty—I can do feisty. “Listen, Miss—”
“Shandy. You can call me Shandy.”
“Is your middle name Tristam?” asked Truman, jokingly.
“Tristane,” she said, the beginnings of a smile playing about her lips. “Nobody gets that,” she added.
“Truman here is Mr. Harvard—”
“Just Iowa State,” Truman amended hastily, casting a glower at Tucker. “He’s always telling lies,” Truman added.
“Don’t all men?” she asked.
Chapter 84
The wind rattled the windows, and presently the power cut out. The four of them looked nervously at each other. Outside the sun had set, but there was still enough light from the snow reflected in the clouds so it wasn’t entirely dark. The snow had piled nearly a third of the way up the door in the meantime, and there was already frost forming on the inside of the windows. “Do you think we can make ourselves something to eat?” asked Kellan, smiling so that he wouldn’t seem like a jerk about it.
“I can see if we still have some burgers,” Shandy said. “Won’t be any fries, though—that involves firing up the deep-fryer and frankly that scares the bejesus outa me.”
“Burgers will be fine,” said Kellan. “Like Tucker said, we don’t want to be any trouble.”
“Trouble’s a relative term, isn’t it, though?” she asked.
“Are we being a bother to you?” asked Tucker. “Sorry if we are—but we can’t exactly—”
Beneath them the generator cut in. They could hear it pumping current, but the lights stayed out. “It powers the refrigerator and the freezer,” she said, as she led them into the kitchen. She hoped Marvin wouldn’t mind. But out here, it could be a day before they got shoveled out—and that was after the storm started, too. He couldn’t expect them to not eat anything. Besides—they put a pair of twenties under the salt-and-pepper set by the register—it wasn’t as if they weren’t paying.
She opened the freezer. “Well, we have fish sticks—oh, good, we do have burgers,” she said, brightly. “I don’t recommend the fish sticks,” she added, as she took out a strip of vacuum-sealed patties. She used a pair of scissors to cut off four of them—and then she reconsidered and cut off three more. “Stick these in the microwave, please,” she said, handing them to Truman. “Something like fifteen minutes on the defrost setting.”
Truman’s eyes got big and he seemed to have lost the ability to speak. Tucker grinned at Kellan; Kellan merely rolled his eyes. Tucker was, no doubt, thinking about getting Truman laid. The guy was such a sex maniac—if it weren’t for the fact that he somehow succeeded in getting laid almost every time he put his mind to it, it would be downright creepy.
“Want me to help you with the buns, ma’am?” Kellan asked. She’d taken out a cutting board.
“Thanks,” she said, handing him a back of kaiser rolls—the good stuff, Kellan noticed. He’d have to remember Vernon. Most years they’d driven right through the town on their way to Kansas, but for a burger this good—with cheese that she had to cut off of the block, and mushrooms and bacon that she was frying together now—he could stand for stopping an hour early.
By the time the burgers were finished even Tucker was drooling—for food, for once, Kellan thought, sourly. But even he couldn’t stay sullen for long: she brought them out to the counter, filling the diner with the scent of hot grilled burgers. She lit a few of the candles that were supposed to be for the diners, and the atmosphere would have been romantic had their stomachs not been rumbling as loudly as they were. Watching the patties brown on the grill, and getting layered with mushrooms, bacon, and onion, with a thick slab of cheese melting over everything, had turned on an appetite for something even more basic than sex, even in Tucker. The sharp, smoky tang of the barbecue sauce, and the crisp crunch of the lettuce and sharp sourness of the pickles put Kellan in heaven, and he was halfway through his first burger before he thought to look up and say, “Thanks, Miss—”
“Shandy,” she said, quietly. She was sitting across from them, on the register side of the counter. “My name’s Shandy.”
“No disrespect meant,” he said. “I just—you’re a lady—”
She giggled. “You’re the first person who’s ever called me a lady,” she said. “Most people call me a girl.”
“You’re old enough to work here,” Kellan said. “Makes you a lady in my book.”
It was funny to see Tucker trying to decide whether he was hungrier or hornier, watching him frantically chew on the oversized mouthful that he’d taken. Truman was smirking. Kellan asked, “You got anybody? I mean, we’re glad you’re here ‘cuz otherwise I’d be scraping froz
en puke outta my truck. But surely someone misses you, don’t they?”
Shandy shook her head. “I been on a couple dates in high school, but it was never anything serious,” she said. “Only been in Vernon for five months, and most here are just passin’ through—it’s hard to get to know people like that.”
“Must be tough,” Kellan said, nodding sympathetically. “My girlfriend and I split up last year, too. Ranchin’s hard—you’re out there for the better part of the year. Gets hard for the other person. Truman here—he’s lucky. He’s still a virgin—”
Truman’s jaw fell open in shock. Kellan shrugged. What? “He don’t know about disappointment yet,” Kellan said.
“And Tucker?” she asked.
Tucker forced the last lump of cheeseburger down his throat and said, “I’ve got girls in every state east of the Rockies,” he crowed.
“He’s braggin’,” Kellan said. “He mighta had sex with in every state east of the Rockies, but I’m pretty sure there are more women that don’t care to see him than those that do.”
She smiled shyly and pressed her lips together, as if trying to work up the courage to tell Kellan something secret. “Aw, you do have someone,” he said, grinning. “Who is he?”
She blinked, and seemed to reconsider. Then she shook her head and took the plates away. Presently they could hear her washing the dishes. Tucker turned to Kellan and scowled, saying, “Thanks for ruining it.
Chapter 85
Outside the snow kept piling up. It had buried the truck up to the bumpers already, and Truman, who had one of those fancy smartphones, opened up the weather app, and found that the storm was only about a third of the way finished. “Shit,” said Kellan, shaking his head. “Looks like we’re stuck here for at least another day.”
“Well, that ain’t gonna stop me from making the most of it,” Tucker said, standing up and following her into the kitchen.
